Writing foul language dialogue is not for wimpy writers or readers. But let’s face facts, words like s^*# and f^#k are part of the modern vernacular unless you’ve been living with Tibetan monks and even then, I am sure they know the seven dirty words.
If you are writing crime drama and crafting dialogue between cops and/or reporters, as I am currently doing with “Shrouded in Pompei,” these words roll off the tongue as easily as damn and darn. If the reader is not familiar with the milieu of a police precinct, jail or newsroom, it is up to the writer to introduce him/her to it through believable characters.
In this age of uber political correctness and hypersensitivity, writers cannot yield to every puritanical interest who may be offended because the chosen dialogue adds to the realism of bringing the story to life. The screenplay for the “Wolf of Wall Street” has received so much press because it uses the F-word more than 500 times. Really? Who wasted three hours of their life counting such nonsense rather than focusing on whether the film is a good piece of cinema? If the reader is offended by such dialogue then perhaps they should be reading fantasies and romances. You always have a choice – buy another book.
SPOILER ALERT: Reporters curse on occasion and while I don’t use foul language a great deal in “Shrouded in Pompei,” to omit it would not serve the art in any respect. So, feel free to count away. At least it means you’ll be reading from start to finish.
